Trey Songz reveals why he loves Ethiopian Food

For the first time on the show this season, all Coke Studio Africa season 4 artistes got a chance to discover each other’s cultural foods. During lunches populated with yummy African food and cold bottle of Coke, the artistes talked about their various cultural backgrounds and how that affects their careers in music.

US RnB hit maker Trey Songz shared the table with Yemi Alade (Nigeria), Emtee (South Africa) and Lij Michael (Ethiopia) at Mummy Dadas – a Nairobi restaurant known for serving popular African food. Trey sampled some diverse African cuisine, but during table talk made no mention of his current relationship status. He did however talk about his first girlfriend.

While Lij presented Trey with some Ethiopian Injera and Tibs, Emtee had some Sisha Nyama (popular South African Braai also referred to as Nyama Choma in Kenya) to share and Yemi Alade offered some Egusi Soup, Plantain, Pounded Yam and Jollof Rice. While eating the food Trey revealed: “I noticed the Ethiopian platter on the table was the same as the one I used to eat with my first girlfriend and her family. She was Ethiopian.”

Emtee, one of South Africa’s newer hip-hop acts, recalled his struggle to the top.

“It was difficult a few years ago to make it as a hip hop artiste. My parents also weren’t supportive and only started to support recently when things started working… Life in South Africa for artistes is growing as musicians can now make a living off of music.”

An accomplished superstar of our time, Trey also talked about his early days in music.

“I remember when I was doing mixtapes and singing on rap tapes and people were like ‘What are you doing?’ We all had these dreams. If you don’t know what’s entitled to you, you’re never going to have it. You need to be informed because when anything happens [or an opportunity arises] you can’t make excuses.”

Yemi congratulated all the artistes for rising above their personal challenges and elevating hip-hop as a genre. “It’s good to see that hip hop artistes are coming out to do what they love to do.”

Talking about the ups and downs of the music industry isn’t always the easiest topic. The Food Exchange segment made it simpler for the Coke Studio artistes to converse on culture and collaborations.

“It’s such a great way that Coke Studio has put us together to talk about our differences as well as our similarities,” Trey said about the segment, with Emtee adding, “we get to learn about the cultural background of our collaborating artistes.”